Barb Brouwer
Contributor
Covid may have shut down live concerts but it can’t stop the music.
In fact, Altered States II, Roots and Blues’ second online festival, will be open to a much broader audience.
Artistic director Peter North has signed nine acts to perform on the festival’s own website on Friday, Aug. 13 and Saturday, Aug. 14.
Anyone who was present as Colin James brought the 2018 festival to an electrifying close will be delighted to hear the Canadian blues sensation will be closing Saturday night of this year’s digital festival.
As an exciting bonus, programming will include footage from that main stage closing set.
“Colin will also deliver a handful of new acoustic performances along with reflections on his last Roots & Blues performance,” said North, noting performances are currently being recorded and videotaped in studios in White Rock, Edmonton and Winnipeg. “Audiences will be able to watch sets from a number of acts who have been on a roll despite the slowdown in cultural activity over the last 16 months.”
Two Indigenous singer-songwriters, Caleigh Cardinal from Edmonton, and Winnipeg’s William Prince have watched their profiles rise considerably in the last few years.
Cardinal is most noted for her 2019 breakthrough album, “Stories from a Downtown Apartment,” which won the Juno Award for Indigenous Music Album of the Year at the 2020 Juno Awards.
Prince won the Juno for Contemporary Roots Album of the Year in 2017 for his debut album, “Earthly Days.” His 2020 album, “Reliever,” earned a nomination for Contemporary Roots Album of the Year at the Junos, which were broadcast in early June on CBC.
Earlier this year Prince won two Canadian Folk Music Awards, one for Contemporary Album of the Year and the other for English Songwriter of the Year.
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Clear some room in your house and get set to swing to the music of Blue Moon Marquee performing in a quartet format, with Darcy Phillips on piano and sax player Morgan Rennef Onda.
Marquee drummer, bassist and singer, Jasmine Colette, a.k.a. Badlands Jass, and longtime partner, guitarist and singer A.W. Cardinal write and perform original compositions influenced by “anything that swings, jumps or grooves.”
“Our big news is that for our next recording project, we’ll be produced by American blues legend Duke Robillard,” said Colette.
The duo, which was nominated for Indigenous Artists of the year in 2017, is set to tour Spain once pandemic travel restrictions are relaxed.
Originally from Alberta, the Vancouver Island-based group shot their segment at Blue Frog Studios in White Rock early last week.
Rounding out the Altered States II lineup are The Small Glories who won the 2020 Folk Alliance Group of the Year Award, Victoria-based folk-pop group Jon and Roy, singer-songwriter Ben Sures, Roots & Blues House Band leader Brent Parkin, and West Coast favourite Jesse Roper.
The free shows will be broadcast on the Roots & Blues website – www.rootsandblues.ca – on Aug. 13 and 14 at 7 p.m. Pacific time. More information will be posted on the Roots & Blues website in coming weeks.
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